Simon Tolkien Inspector Trave Trilogy: Orders From Berlin, The Inheritance, The King of Diamonds. Simon Tolkien
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a machine they’ve turned on and now they can’t turn it off. However hard they try, they can’t put the genie back in the bottle. Not that they seem to be trying too hard, judging by Churchill’s fighting talk.’
‘That’s because it’s too late. No one in this country wanted war.’
‘Maybe not. But that’s not my point,’ said Seaforth, warming to his theme. ‘Think of the last war: the war to end wars. Four years of slaughter, and for what? Twenty years of peace. Doesn’t that tell you anything, Ava? About what’s happening; about the future?’
‘You can’t talk like that,’ she said, appalled by Seaforth’s cynicism. She couldn’t understand it – it was almost as if he were happy about the arrival of Armageddon.
‘Why not? If it’s the truth? Wars are fought so that the people who make the machines can make money out of them. The only difference now is that the machines are more powerful and the weapons are more deadly. I tell you, behind every tank, behind every bomb, is a man with a roll of banknotes – pounds or Reichsmarks, it doesn’t matter.’
‘I don’t know. Maybe you’re right,’ she said. ‘But that doesn’t mean that we don’t have to fight. The Germans are evil. Everyone knows that.’
‘What. All of them?’
‘Yes, all of them,’ she insisted. ‘There was a woman in the butcher’s shop the other day who told me about one of their fighter pilots flying low over the park last week. He saw her out with her children and he tried to machine-gun them. She got the kids under a bench and lay on top of them, and they survived somehow. But she said he was laughing – laughing while he tried to kill them. Can you believe that? I hate the Germans. And I’m surprised you don’t too,’ she added passionately. ‘They killed your father, didn’t they? Isn’t that what you told me?’
Seaforth flinched and she stopped, wishing she could take her words back. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I shouldn’t have said that.’
‘No, you’re right,’ he said harshly. ‘The war must go on. The beast must be fed.’
At the restaurant, Seaforth kept twisting about in his chair after they had sat down, unable to get comfortable, and he seemed to settle in his seat only after the waiter had brought them wine and he had downed two glasses in rapid succession.
He looked up, catching her eye. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m not being good company tonight, I know. There’s a lot of pressure at work, but I should learn to leave it behind when I’m not there.’ It was an olive branch and it should have made her feel relieved, but instead she felt for some reason that he was putting on a mask and the real Seaforth was the harsh nihilist she had glimpsed on the walk over.
‘I’m glad I’m here,’ he added, reaching out and covering her hand with his. ‘You look beautiful tonight, Ava. Really you do. Forgive me for being such a brute.’
And she did, trying hard to banish her doubts. How could she not forgive him, looking down at his long, slender fingers touching hers? Like a pianist’s, she remembered she’d thought when he’d put his hand on her arm at the funeral.
‘You’re not wearing your ring,’ he said, turning her hand over and looking up into her face as if he were asking a question instead of stating a fact.
‘I didn’t want to think about Bertram,’ she said, but realized as she spoke that it was a vain wish. She knew she wouldn’t have any peace until she’d found out who’d killed her father.
‘I understand,’ he said. ‘None of this has been easy.’
‘No, but it would help if I knew what you want with me,’ she blurted out. If only he’d open up, then maybe she could start believing in him; maybe she could enjoy his interest in her.
‘I want nothing,’ he said, looking her in the eye. ‘Now that I know you’re safe, I want nothing except the pleasure of your company. I like you, Ava. Isn’t that enough?’
It wasn’t, but she couldn’t tell him that. So she smiled and, leaning forward, finished her glass of wine and waited for him to pour her another.
The siren went off just as Seaforth had finished paying the bill and they’d got up to go. Ava hated the sound of it, and instinctively she put her hands over her ears, trying to block out its undulating wail.
He looked at her and smiled. ‘You really have had enough of the war for one night,’ he said. ‘Come on. Let’s go.’
‘Where?’
‘To my place. It’s near here. Just around the corner.’
‘You never told me that.’
‘I’m a man of many secrets, remember?’
‘What about the siren? Shouldn’t we take shelter?’
‘With the trogs down in the Underground?’ he asked, pointing down the street towards the square, where a rapidly growing queue of people had formed outside the Tube station. ‘It’s up to you, but I think I could live without overflowing toilets and rats for one night. There’ve been no bombs in Chelsea for a couple of days now, and there’s a shelter round the corner in Cadogan Place if you get scared. And I can take you home later. I promise,’ he added, noticing her hesitation.
Ava wasn’t really frightened of the bombs, at least not before they had started to fall. She was more concerned about what kind of signal she would be sending Seaforth by going back to his house or flat or wherever it was that he lived. She didn’t want him to think of her as some woman of easy virtue who could be seduced over a couple of bottles of wine in an Italian restaurant, but she’d come out determined to find out what made him tick, and to do that she needed to see where he lived. It was an opportunity that she couldn’t afford to pass up.
He took her arm and led her behind the Peter Jones department store into a district of tall, turn-of-the-century red-brick houses. Ava knew that it took money, a lot of money, to live here on the borders of Knightsbridge, and she wondered how Seaforth could afford it. But perhaps spying paid well. She remembered how affluent her miserly father had turned out to be.
They turned the corner and came out into Cadogan Square. It was the jewel of the neighbourhood, visually impressive even without the wrought-iron railings that had been removed the previous year to be melted down for the war effort. The tall, stately houses surrounding the gardens on all four sides seemed unchanged by time, far removed from the bustle of Sloane Square two blocks away and the war-torn world beyond. There was no one in sight as they walked across the grass and then up the wide steps of a well-maintained house under a brick portico supported by elaborately decorated Corinthian columns. The door was unlocked and they went inside and took a narrow, wood-panelled elevator to the top floor.
When Seaforth opened the door of his apartment, she let out a cry of surprise. Even in the failing light, the panoramic view was extraordinary. There were landmarks she recognized in all directions – the tower of Westminster Cathedral, Big Ben beside the river, and to the south the white chimneys of Battersea Power Station. She would have liked to spend longer staring out of the windows, but Seaforth was already going round lowering the blackout blinds.
He turned on the lights and went to hang up her coat, leaving her to look round at the furnishings of the apartment. She could see straight away that they were expensive, but she was now prepared for that. She was surprised rather by the look of the place. It was not at all what she would have expected. Everything was modern, characterized by hard, severe lines. The sofa and the armchairs had tubular steel frames, and the desk in the corner was made of some form of metal too. A pair of rectangular jet-black vases on a table in front of the centre window held no flowers. There were a multitude of books, and she recognized some of the titles from her father’s collection, but their arrangement was entirely different from the organized chaos in Gloucester Mansions. Here the spines were lined up in precisely descending heights on built-in bookcases. Nothing was out of place.
She looked around in vain for